Synology NAS - Transfer speed issue

Firegod · 13 Jul 2011 at 18:43

Hi

Just wondering if any fellow Synology users have come across this before.

I am running the latest firmware on my DS211j, v3.1-1748. If I transfer files via Windows I get the below speed:-

But if I login to the NAS and use the upload feature within there, I only get:-

Why is it so slow in comparison? They are all set to Gig connection (no jumbo frames), yet Windows copy is so much faster. Any thoughts? I may have to raise another ticket with Synology support if not.

Firegod · 14 Jul 2011 at 17:38

Thanks for the replies.

@deuse, the speeds were never that bad within the Synology GUI though, that's my conundrum. It's been awhile since I've actually transferred stuff via that method (and a few firmware revisions ago), but it was never speeds down in KB/s.

@Skidilliplop, my Windows NIC shows 1.0 GBs and all switches are showing Green LEDs (i.e. 1.0 GBs connections). Logged in the NAS and it is showing "1000, Full Duplex, MTU 1500".

I did read on one of the 13-page threads from the Synology forum about this issue, and some person had luck replacing the Cat5e cable on the NAS to a Cat6 cable. But all the switches, Cat5e cable, Powerline AV2 adapters that I have are brand new.

I might try replacing the cable regardless with a spare just to rule it out, but something is wrong somewhere.

Firegod · 15 Jul 2011 at 19:37

deuse said:
Try flash FXP and see what you get. I never use the synology software for moving files.

OK I'll give that a go, cheers. I've just downloaded the 30 day trial from http://www.flashfxp.com/index.php but are you able to help with how I set it up for the NAS?

I'll have a click around now, but I'm not too sure what to do. Do I need to enable FTP stuff on the NAS?

Thanks.

Firegod · 15 Jul 2011 at 19:46

Ah ignore the above, was easy enough to do. Well that transferred at 5.05 MB/s so it seems that it is the Synology "software" to blame?

Firegod · 17 Jul 2011 at 17:38

deuse said:
5.05MB are you sure? Using flash you should get at least PC-Nas 30-45MB and Nas to PC-50-70MB a sec.

Try a rared file say about 700MB in size and see what you get. 5.05MB a sec does not look right to me.

Ah thanks deuse. OK I tried it with a 700MB test zip, screenshot below. Only get just over 7 MB/s.

Hmm wonder why I don't get anywhere near 30MB. :confused:

I'll try getting a CAT6 cable from work and replace the one on the NAS, see what happens I guess.

Firegod · 17 Jul 2011 at 17:54

Disabled "flow control" on my NIC and upped to 8MB/s on the same transfer.

Firegod · 17 Jul 2011 at 18:08

Think I may have stumbled on to a lead here. Doing some Google searching and saw that the HDD could be limiting the transfer speed.

Now, I remember checking the disks before I installed them into the NAS for errors, and also setting their "mode" to quiet.

Ran the Disk utility and look what we get:-

I might try taking them out, and setting the "mode" back to performance (or the equivalent setting). Could that be something that would reduce the rate so drastically?

Firegod · 17 Jul 2011 at 18:58

Well, set AAM to "fast" and it made no difference to the Sequential Read/Write numbers. Just swapped the patch cable over with a spare CAT5e cable I found. See if that makes a difference.

Firegod · 17 Jul 2011 at 19:20

I'm in two minds whether to blow the array away and start again, except I have 122GB of data on the drives. That's going to take over 5 hours to transfer off at 6 MB/s. It's a lot of time if it's going to make zero difference!

Firegod · 17 Jul 2011 at 21:31

deuse said:
I would try to sort this out before you go and start again. I have the new update on my 211j on a gig network with no problems.

I know that does not help you but connect the nas to the pc and try again see what happens it could be a switch playing up
I don't have raid because I don't it's worth it on 2 HDs.

Yeah good idea. I'll hook it up to the other switch by the PC and see if its the same. Just also thought I should try the disk benchmark again, but with the HDD from the NAS in the PC. Make sure it does indeed run faster.

Firegod · 18 Jul 2011 at 18:00

enigma27 said:
Firegod do you by any chance have a Samsung F4 eco drive?

Hi, no I have x2 [FONT=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]Samsung Eco Green F2 1.5TB Hard Drive's.[/FONT]

Firegod · 18 Jul 2011 at 18:02

Skidilliplop said:
I'd be tempted to pull the drives out of the NAS and try them in your PC. a) it's a lot faster for getting your data backed up to the PC if you want to trash and start again on the NAS. b) it'll let you see if the drives are the limitation. Which I doubt, the only drives I've seen to transfer at <10MB/s sustained have been properly broken. In RAID1 you'd have to get two equally broken ones to only read off at that speed. Also if it's RAID1 you could try pulling each disk out in turn and running off a single disk which may lend a further clue.

I've put one of the drives into my PC, but I can't get it to show in My Computer. (Have tried the other drive too). I've gone in to Computer Management > Disk Management, but all I see is:-

It shows x3 basic disks, and I get no options. If I click where it says "Disk 1" in the Red Box, I can only select "Dynamic Volume..." but I don't know if I need to do that?

Any advice? :confused:

Thanks!

Firegod · 18 Jul 2011 at 18:28

OK, so found that from here, http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc771775.aspx:-
Partitions on basic disks added to the system do not appear in the Disk Management volume list view.

Cause:Volumes on basic disks added to the system are not automatically mounted and assigned drive letters by default.

Solution:Manually mount the basic volumes by assigning drive letters, or by creating mount points using Disk Management or the DiskPart or mountvol commands.

And DiskPart takes me to here:-

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc773140(WS.10).aspx#BKMK_1

But I still can't assign a driver letter manually. I'm wondering if I do need to make it dynamic, as that says that "any existing partitions on the disk become simple volumes." And if I make them volumes, they can be assigned drive letters.

What we thinking, yeah?

Firegod · 18 Jul 2011 at 18:50

OK, dynamic disk did not work and I've ended up formatting the disk. On the plus side, I ran the Disk Mark utility and the speeds were all 100+ MB/s. I'll stick the disk back into the NAS and hopefully, the data from the untouched disk will copy back over.

Firegod · 18 Jul 2011 at 18:51

But would still like to get the data off somehow. Dynamic Disk does not appear to be the answer...

Firegod · 19 Jul 2011 at 17:10

Skidilliplop said:
You might be limited by the formatting. If it's not NTFS or FAT32 windows won't see it. Booting from a Linux live CD would let you at pretty much any filesystem you can think of to copy across to your PC.

I'm assuming the partition filesystem comes up "unknown" in disk management, but can't say for sure because you have the context menu hiding most of the useful info in that screenshot

Haha hey don't be blaming my screenshot work.

It didn't even say unknown, but a chap at work mentioned what you have about the file system. Said it's probably something Windows won't recognise.

But now for the good news!

Since I put the formatted drive back in the NAS and it rebuilt last night from the untouched disk, I've ran the Disk Benchmark again (which previously gave ~6 MB/s) and it now shows....

55 MB/s read and 38 MB/s write!

I have no idea how! I'm guessing there were inconsistencies in the mirror? Now to see if the result stays the same when I move it back to the original switch! :cool: